Statement on Signing the
Military Construction Appropriations Act, Fiscal Year 1989

September 27, 1988

I
have today signed H.R. 4586, the Military Construction Appropriations Act for
Fiscal Year 1989. The Act appropriates $9.1 billion for military construction
programs for the fiscal year that begins October 1. The Act funds these
programs at responsible levels for fiscal year 1989 that are consistent with
the Nation's defense needs and with the need for fiscal restraint. This is the
sixth appropriations act that I have approved for the coming fiscal year.

Section
116 of the Act provides that the Secretary of Defense is to inform specified
congressional committees of the plans and scope for any proposed military
exercise involving United States personnel 30 days prior to its occurring, if
amounts expended for construction are anticipated to exceed $100,000. I have
approved H.R. 4586 with the understanding that Section 116 encompasses only
exercises where providing thirty days' advance notice is feasible and
consistent with my constitutional authority and duty to protect the national
security.

Section
125 of H.R. 4586 provides that the Secretary of Defense shall include in the
fiscal year 1990 program a legislative proposal to authorize the installment purchase
by the Government of military housing units and that the budget request for
fiscal year 1990 shall include a request for sums necessary to implement a
pilot program for not to exceed 3,000 units. The Constitution grants
exclusively to the President the power to recommend for the consideration of
the Congress such measures as he judges necessary and expedient. Because the
Congress may not by law command the President to exercise in particular
circumstances the power that the Constitution commits to his judgment, such
provisions have been consistently treated as advisory, not mandatory.

Ronald
Reagan

The
White House,

September 27, 1988.

Note: H.R. 4586,
approved September 27, was assigned Public Law No. 100 - 447. The statement was
released by the Office of the Press Secretary on September 28.